


two four

by evaagna



Category: Prodigal Son (TV 2019)
Genre: Blood, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Relationship can be read as platonic or romantic, Self-Harm, Suicidal Thoughts, Suicide Attempt
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-02-09
Updated: 2020-02-09
Packaged: 2021-02-27 22:35:57
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,381
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22623418
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/evaagna/pseuds/evaagna
Summary: Malcolm hasn't slept in days and is at the end of his rope.
Relationships: Gil Arroyo & Malcolm Bright, Gil Arroyo/Malcolm Bright, Malcolm Bright & Sunshine the Bird
Comments: 18
Kudos: 195
Collections: Prodigal Son Kink Meme





	two four

**Author's Note:**

> Written for [this PSon Kink Meme](https://prodigal-kink.dreamwidth.org/447.html?thread=33727#cmt33727) prompt.

Malcolm doesn’t move for a long time when his alarm goes off that morning. He lies there, wrists still in cuffs, staring at the ceiling until the incessant buzzing becomes too much to bear. Even then, he lingers another moment before finally sitting up and releasing himself with a flick to each restraint. His head is full of fog, sluggish and racing and trapped all at once. He’s not sure that he so much as closed his eyes in the long, dark hours of the night; he slept two hours four nights ago and maybe three five nights before that, but not more than ten total in the last two weeks. The night before last, he’d walked, walked, aimlessly walked through the city until the sun rose and he didn’t think his legs could carry him another step. It didn’t help.

Still in bed, he rubs at his eyes and sees a flash of a dark figure in the peripherals of his vision. He ignores her as best he can— _She’s not real_. 

Yoga. Right. He's supposed to do yoga. And put on some upbeat music to energize him for the day. He hadn't done either yesterday, but at least he'd managed to get down his pills. He has a routine to follow for a reason.

Today he all but stumbles to the kitchen, letting Sunshine out as he goes. He's supposed to do yoga. That's probably not going to happen today, either. Instead he sinks onto a stool, stares at the four bottles in their neat row, and does nothing, just stares. He knows that he needs to take them; it's for his own good. They're supposed to help him, but— If this is how he feels _with_ them, then what's even the point?

The logical part of his mind stays eerily silent. He’s not thinking straight, and he knows that, but— But— He can’t do this anymore. He doesn’t _want_ to.

The team's last case was a hard one. At first there were only two victims, until he’d connected three cold cases to the same killer. Even then, four more bodies turned up before the team was able to pin the guy down. Malcolm, especially, had taken it hard. It wasn't his fault, and he knew that, the team knew that. But that doesn’t change the fact that if he’d just been a little bit smarter, a little bit faster putting together the clues...

Gil had ordered—all but begged—him to take a break. 

In fact, they haven't needed him on a case in over a week and he can tell that Gil is getting frustrated with his daily—okay, sometimes more than daily—texts asking if anything new has come up. The longer he spends without a good murder to solve, without something to occupy his mind, the worse his nightmares get. They haunt him now, even in the light of day. The girl in the box has become a near constant presence, lurking over his shoulder with cold whispers: _find me, find me, find me_. 

It's getting to the point that he's not sure that even a case will be enough. If he doesn't sleep at least a little bit, his body and mind can't function, but if he sleeps at all, he wakes up screaming, heart racing, covered in sweat, more tired than he was before.

He can't do this. 

He doesn't want to do this anymore, and a little voice in the back of his mind tells him that he doesn't have to. 

He should call Gabrielle. That would probably be a good idea. That’s what she’s there for, she’d tell him. But his hand doesn't go to his phone, even though it's right there within reach. He already knows what she'll say and he's not sure that he wants to hear it this time. 

He eyes his bottles of pills for a moment longer, but no, that's not likely to be the easiest way to do it. The body has a wide variety of safety mechanisms built in— a bad cocktail of pills inducing vomiting to purge them before they can get into his system, severed vessels contracting to minimize blood loss, the pain itself a warning and a deterrent, and so on. Fortunately there are ways around all that.

Malcolm stands, having to pause to steady himself as he does. He makes his way into the bathroom and pops open the medicine cabinet. There should be a single blade razor somewhere in here—a gift from someone last Christmas, great for that perfect, smooth shave—and the extra replacement blades should be plenty sharp for what he needs. He finds it without too much delay and hesitates a moment to weigh the blade in his palm, taking a deep breath, considering. His hand isn’t even shaking.

The carotid would work, of course. It's probably the most effective, but it's always seemed a bit overdramatic, even for him. No, not the carotid. He slides to the floor, setting the razor down next to his feet, and rolls up a sleeve. The brachial artery, just above the elbow, should do the job. The key will be to miss the median nerve, which runs alongside it. That would be excruciating, regardless of pain tolerance, and there's no reason to make this worse than it needs to be. Fortunately he knows exactly where to cut and how deep. Afterall, his father taught him all about anatomy when he was young. That thought makes him feel sick; Martin Whitly, too, haunts him even now.

The part of his mind that's detached and floating far away expects this to be just as distant, but it's not. It hurts, from the first sting of blade to skin, building, building to the deep, searing pain of slicing flesh. But it numbs as the ringing in his ears builds to a crescendo and his mind relaxes, knowing peace is just a few hair’s breadths away. 

He's just about to reach the artery when he hears a flutter and a chirp. As he looks up, Sunshine lands in the doorway, hopping from foot to foot in a little dance. She spreads her wings, flaps pointedly a few times, and— He forgot to feed her. He let her out of her cage, but he never fed her. Shit, who's going to take care of her? 

The blade clatters to the floor. His fingers are shaking.

 _Shit_. What is he doing?

He can't— He doesn't want to— He doesn't want to live like this anymore, but he doesn't want to _die_.

His hands scramble for the first thing within reach—a bath towel, pulled from it’s rack just above his left shoulder—and press it to the wound. The white terry cloth blooms red in sluggish pulses in time with his heart. There’s blood on his pants and the floor too, but he doesn’t even see it. 

His phone— He needs his phone. He needs to call someone. But his phone is on the counter where he left it, out in the kitchen. 

Malcolm forces himself up from the cold tile floor and stumbles towards the kitchen. It’s awkward, keeping the towel firmly against his arm while flicking through his contacts, but he manages to scroll down to _G_. He doesn’t think, just presses _call_. 

Gil answers on the second to last ring.

“Gil—” Malcolm’s greeting is cut off with a shallow gasp. He’s lightheaded, all of a sudden, but he can’t tell if it’s just the situation, the anxiety, the guilt, or the actual blood loss. 

Gil’s voice is such a relief that he almost laughs. “Kid, I told you yesterday that I'll call you when we've got something for you. You’re supposed to be taking a break, remember?" There's a long pause, Malcolm too focused on drinking in the sound to answer. "Bright?”

He sinks to the floor, putting his phone on speaker and dropping it to sit by his feet, then props his wounded arm up on a leg and lets his head droop between his knees. “Hey, Gil,” he breathes, “Don’t be mad, okay?"

There’s a rustling of papers, like Gil’s just knocked a stack of files off his desk. "Bright, what happened?"

“I— I might have done something stupid.”


End file.
